'King tide' hits coast Thursday

Sandy beaches will become slimmer, or might be submerged under ocean water all together.

Water levels will rise nearly to the level of docks in some spots of harbors, and bay water might even spill over sea walls. Surfers will be stuck in mushy waves swamped out by the high tide, messing up the shape of the surf. Hopefully, streets will not be flooded over with water.

The highest tide of the year – called the "King Tide" – will happen today, and the extreme tides are creating a buzz along the California coastline and here in Orange County. Water levels will reach a high tide of 7.11 feet about 8:14 a.m. today, before slowly coming down the next few days.

For the Orange County Coastkeeper, it means a chance to document what rising sea levels might look like in the future. Already, the public has submitted images from Wednesday's high tide to the Coastkeeper flicker account from various spots along the coast like San Francisco and San Rafael, and the group is hoping Orange County residents will do the same.

Locations that could show evidence of high tides include Sunset and Seal Beach, Huntington Harbour, and Balboa Peninsula and Island in Newport Beach.

In Northern California, the San Francisco Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve has been working to do long-term research on rising sea levels along with the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association.

Heidi Nutters, coastal training program coordinator, said that there's no correlation between the king tides and rising sea levels, but the incident gives a glimpse at what coastlines may look like when sea levels do rise in the future.

The Coastkeeper group cited a report released this year by the National Academy of Sciences projects that predicts sea levels to rise about one foot by 2050, and by 2100 it is expected to rise five feet above sea level.

Nutters said several roads were closed on Wednesday in San Francisco because of flooding, and these high tides can prepare people and show them how to be more resilient to sea level rises in the future.

The high tide happening today is the second of four winter king tides events. The first was mid-November, and the next happens Jan. 9 through Jan. 11. This is the highest tide so far this year. The closest its come was an extreme tide on Jan. 22 at a 6.36 foot high tide, said Pamela Crouch, director of communications for Orange County Coastkeeper.

It's a chance to make a case for adding natural buffers like restoring tidal wetlands or adding eelgrass beds between the waterfront and buildings, rather than putting up sea walls that can be destructive to beaches after they are built. Sea walls limit public access and can be costly to build and maintain, said Crouch.

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